But if by some freak of history communism had caught up with this country, I would have been one of the first people thrown in jail.

A song is like a picture of a bird in flight; the bird was moving before the picture was taken, and no doubt continued after.

Alan Lomax is the person who I think should be given major credit for what has been called the "Folk Song Revival." My father participated with him because my father was a musicologist and urged trained musicians to learn about "the vernacular."

Town after town has but one newspaper or one radio station. It is often owned by Murdoch. Yes, we don't have as much freedom of the press as we think we have - although the traditional freedom of speech is strongly rooted in American culture.

I used to agree with Kurt Vonnegut, who said that the human race has a snowball's chance in hell of being around a hundred years from now.

The world will be solved by millions of small things.

I write a song because I want to. I think the moment you start writing it to make money, you're starting to kill yourself artistically.